The Knicks and Magic will hoop it up Friday night, but the real story won’t even touch the ball. The story is Patrick Ewing.

Ewing’s No. 33 jersey will be raised to the Garden rafters, and both ESPN and MSG Network will be trying to capture the human part of the event.

“If Patrick Ewing gets emotional, you will see it,” Tom McNeeley, ESPN’s NBA producer, told NYP TV Sports. “Like Jim McKay said in his documentary, the stories are the people who play the games.”

Added MSG producer Leon Schweir: “The audience [will turn] into a theatrical audience. We’re not big on crowd shots, but you want to see their reactions. That’s what you’re aiming for, to capture that.”

MSG will pick up its extensive coverage early, beginning at 4 p.m., where “Talk of Our Town” will be broadcast from the Garden’s theater lobby. Hosts Bill Daughtry and Bob Wischusen hope to have some of the A-list guests, such as Michael Jordan and Pat Riley, who are scheduled to help honor Ewing.

At 5:30, the network plans to carry Ewing’s news conference live, before Steve Cangialosi takes the handoff at 6 p.m. for some one-on-ones with more guests. Finally, a pregame roundtable with some of Ewing’s friends and former teammates will take viewers into the game itself.

In addition to the 22-minute halftime ceremony in which the jersey will be officially raised both MSG and ESPN will have other look-ins of the festivities.

MSG’s hallway camera will show some of the preparations unfolding. ESPN sideline reporter Michelle Tafoya will talk to some of Ewing’s guests during the game. ESPN is also hoping to have Ewing miked from his courtside seat, though that might not be set until gametime.

Most of these kinds of innovations weren’t in place the last time a Knick number was retired (Dick McGuire in 1992). When you couple them with ESPN’s national coverage, it means that, Knick-wise, Ewing’s night should be unprecedented.

“I think because of the expanded media coverage now, not only locally but around the country, this will be the biggest ever,” said Marv Albert, who will host the ceremony and who has been in attendance for every retired Knick number.

“[Other retired number ceremonies] got great attention in New York but they didn’t have same attention nationally. Just the nature of sports on television has changed.”